Addison, meet Neal Caffery
by Alyssa Wesner
Summary: Addison is a young thief who's sister gets kidnapped and is used to make Addison steal for the kidnapper. Addison and Neal meet and he decides to help her out.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N Originally I was gonna write a book with this but I just haven't gotten far enough with it. Anyway I was watching White Collar and decided to make this a fanfic with some of my own characters.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own White Collar. But I do own Addison and any other character that isn't from White Collar.**

**Preface**

Addison looked at the security scanners of the grocery store. She reasoned that as long as you could get the unscanned barcode over the security scanner then you were in the clear.

The main problem with the theory was that she really couldn't be sure because she didn't know anyone who wanted to try it (except herself, of course).

She sighed and started towards the exit with the unscanned bottle of pop in her hand.

A second later bad country music came blaring out of her pocket, attracting a lot of stares and causing her to jump nearly a foot in the air. Not bothering to check the caller ID because she was pretty sure she already knew who it was, she answered the phone with the standard hello (just in case it wasn't who she thought it was).

"Hi! So what'dya think of your new ringtone?" her sister's perkier than usual voice coming out of the speaker.

Addison almost retorted with something extremely rude before realizing that doing so would be like just like egging her eight-year old sister on. Instead she replied with, "Rachel it didn't affect me one way or the other. Now, why did you call?"

"Mom wanted to know what's taking so long with the groceries? Cause it was only supposed to take you like thirty minutes. I mean, come on! My stomach is eating itself from the inside out!"

"Sorry, the store's pretty crowded." Which was true, except the real reason she was taking so long was because she had been walking around the store aimlessly trying to get up courage to try her crazy plan at stealing the bottle of pop. "Anyway, tell mom I won't be longer than ten more minutes.

She heard her sister start to moan on the other end of the line and shut her phone muttering, "And for some strange, unfathomable reason I love the little girl. Can anyone tell me why?"

Addison made one more pass around the store before actually walking up to the security scanners. As she did she switched the bag of groceries that she had paid for to her left hand and the bottle of pop, which she hadn't paid for, to her right.

She walked straight toward the security scanners and, when she got close enough, casually threw the bottle of pop into the air with a little spin on it like she had just gotten bored. She continued through the scanner and a couple of inches beyond it before catching the bottle again with a smirk on her face.

She looked down at the bottle for a moment with amazement because she heard no alarms or people rushing to stop her from leaving the store. Then, she whispered almost inaudibly to herself, "Maybe it's possible that not all thieves get caught."

It would have been best if she had checked around her before stealing because, as she walked off, a Caucasian man with brown, wavy, semi-slicked back hair and at least half of a branch of the FBI after him was watching her while knowing exactly what she had just done.

**Sorry it's short but this is only the preface if you like it review or favorite it and I'll write some more though beware cause if I do write more there's gonna be a time jump. Oh yeah, in case you missed the hint this story is set before Neal goes to jail. **


	2. Chapter 2

**A/n Ok I'm back which is good for me. I have never actually tried what I described in the last chapter which is kinda sad cause I would love to know if it actually works but so far it's just a theory. Anyway enjoy the new chapter and remember that this museum is made up because it's hard to find actual info on real museum's security soo sorry.**

** Translations are (**_**italicized and in parentheses) **_

**Chapter 1**

**Three years later**

Addison reached out a steady hand and opened the door to the museum while her long dyed-black hair flew into her mouth. She walked inside and took off her sunglasses while looking around for cameras. She caught three pointing at the front door from different angles.

After little more examination, she crossed the front lobby off of her mental list of rooms she could get through without being caught. She then walked up to the front desk and said, "Biglietto per uno, per favore." (_Ticket for one, please.)_

"Quello sar venti euro," (_That will be twenty euro_) the man at the desk replied.

She handed him twenty euros and he handed her a ticket. After a quick, "Grazie," (_Thanks_) she headed into the museum.

In the first room she noted cameras, motion detectors, and heat sensors but, if she made the right moves, she would be able to get through it.

"Alright, what's the damage?" she heard her friend's voice come to life in her ear.

"Wow, I almost jumped a foot in the air on that one," she replied through the comms unit, "You were so quiet for song long that I actually forgot you were there, Alexis."

"Yeah, well. I ditched you to go get some lunch. I was hungry," her friend said which made her sigh.

"Anyway, lobby's out, there's no way I'm going to get through there. First room is possible but tricky, if you turn off the cameras, then I should be able to get through it."

"Don't you look like an idiot, standing there and talking to yourself?"

"No, it's not like I'm advertising that I'm talking to myself. I'm on a bench in a corner of the room where there's no one else around."

"Oh, ok. So is that all you've gotten so far cause it's really not much."

"You're just bitter because you're in the car."

"True! And it was my turn to do recon!"

"Do you not remember what happened the last time you did recon?"

"Of course I do! It wasn't that bad."

"Are you kidding me? You made me wait in the car and the moment you got inside you told me you were hungry and were going to grab a bite to eat from the restaurant. You got the most expensive thing on the menu and spent over and hour eating it, then as you're finally leaving, you see a guy arguing with his girlfriend so you decided to throw his scotch on him and tell him he's petty. If I remember right, after that you ran out of the museum screaming, "The aliens are coming! The aliens are coming!"

"In my defense, I think someone drugged me."

"Okay, if you say so."

"I do an-" Before Alexis could start one of her long rambling arguments, Addison took out her comms unit and stuffed it in the pocket of her jeans.

"Now, for some more recon," she muttered to herself.

She walked through two more rooms taking note of all the security measures and the best paths through them. Her main problem was that Alexis hadn't had any luck hacking the security cameras' footage, yet.

She was so preoccupied by looking up for security cameras that she walked straight into someone's back which caused her to trip, fall to the floor, and whack her head on the tile. She laid there with her vision going in and out of focus and wondering how in the hell had she landed on her back.

When her vision finally came back into focus, she found the man standing over her offering his hand. She took it and he helped haul her back to her feet.

"Grazie…," she said waiting for him to supply a name. She had a nagging suspicion that she had seen him before.

"Nick Holden and it's no problem…," He replied now waiting for her to supply a name.

"Zoey Morgan and how did you know that I spoke- or speak- English?" she asked.

"You look like you're from the US."

"So American people have a look?" she asked him with the one-eyebrow-raised trick that she had recently figured out how to do. "Well, if we do then I'm saying that you're an American."

"I am actually and I have to go."

Her eyes widened infinitesimally as she realized who he was and where she had seen him before.

The man had disappeared by the time that she came back to earth from her thoughts and she was pretty sure that he didn't know that she knew who he was.

She waited until she was back in her quiet corner of the room before she put her comms unit back in her ear just in case. She was greeted by Alexis still going on about something.

"Have you not shut up since I took this thing out of my ear?" she asked.

"Wait, you took it out?" Alexis exclaimed, "So you weren't listening even at all!"

"No, I wasn't. Now, I ran into this guy and-" Addison was cut off by Alexis interrupting with, " Are you trying to set me up on a date?"

"No! Let me finish! So I ran into this guy and I'm pretty sure that it was Neal Caffrey."

"Do you the Neal Caffery the art thief and forger extraordinaire?"

"No, I mean the Neal Caffery that was at my sister's birthday last year," Addison replied with sarcasm coating her voice.

"You know, you should really stop being so sarcastic cause I almost replied with something that would have really pissed you off. Soooo, what do u think he wants?"

"I don't know, but I'm pretty sure that he didn't realize that I recognized him which means that we may still have a chance. We have to strike before he does though," she paused for a second while thinking. "Alexis, pack up the bags cause we're gonna have to strike and run tonight."

Back at the hotel, Neal Caffrey was thinking hard about what he was going to do now. He knew that there was a good chance that the girl had figured out who he was. He had seen her eyes widen.

If she really had figured him out he reasoned that she would report him to the Italian police who would, in turn, tell the FBI. The best case scenario would be that they didn't tell the FBI but, most likely they would.

He decided that he would have to strike that night if he wanted to have any hopes of getting the painting. The first step was just to pick up the phone and call Mozzie for a little help with the getaway.

**I forgot to mention that I don't really speak Italian and I have never been to Italy so I had to use an online translator and I'm sorry if its said or written wrong. Anyway I welcome constructive critism if anybody feels like it and thank you to the three people that did review for my last chapter.**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N Here's another chapter.**

**Chapter 2**

"I have had a life-changing revelation recently," Addison said.

"Oh yeah? And what exactly was it?" Alexis's voice replied through the comms unit.

"People in movies have it easy. Way easy." Addison said as she crawled through the air ducts of the museum pulling a plastic tube along as she did so.

"I'm pretty sure that everyone gets that but why exactly are you pointing it out at this time?" Alexis's voice had changed at the end to sound like one of those recorded messages that people get all the time.

"Okay, first, why are you talking like that? And second, because air ducts are a lot smaller in real life, like claustrophobically small."

"Well then, it's a good thing you're not claustrophobic anymore."

"That's all you're going to say! It's like you don't even care about me!" Addison exclaimed.

"What do you want me to say? It's not like I like can hack the air ducts and make them bigger," Alexis retorted.

"Well you could have- Oh never mind!"

"That's what I thought."

"Anyway," Addison growled, "which way do I go now?"

"Uh," Alexis said as she referred to the blueprints of the building, "go right, then left and the vent that you're looking for is about 2 inches away."

"Can you convert that to real-life size and _not_ blueprint size?"

"Oh yeah! I forgot about that! It's about ten feet in real-life size."

"Thank you."

Addison crawled on in quiet for a bit. She started to get worried because Alexis hadn't talked in five minutes.

"Alexis, have you gone to get food _again_?" she asked not expecting an answer and not getting one either, "You ate on the way here not even twenty minutes ago."

She continued on in quiet and got to the air vent that she was looking for. She had picked the one that she had because, during her recon, she had noticed that it was missing three screws, a very lucky break. Usually it would have been much more complicated and she would have had to have found a way to get three screws out of it without anyone noticing (not easy).

"Alexis, Alexis, oh where have you gone?" she asked hoping for an answer this time.

Upon not receiving one she sighed. She needed to know if Alexis had finally hacked into the video feed or not because that would make a huge difference in what the plan was. She decided that she would have to go with the plan that Alexis hadn't hacked the cameras and prepared herself for the tricky drop from the air vent.

She moved the air vent out of the way by twisting it on its last screw. Just as she was about to drop she heard a quirky, "So where are you now?" from the comms unit.

"About to drop," she replied, "I need to know if you've hacked the cameras."

"Geez, you don't even ask what I was doing."

"I already know what you were doing. You were getting food."

"You know me so well and yes, I hacked the cameras."

"Okay, thank you."

Addison let herself drop through the vent and she landed lightly on the floor despite the 8 foot drop.

"So what's next?" Alexis asked, "You didn't really brief me on this part except that you needed hairspray."

Addison didn't reply, instead she took the can of hairspray out of the round, plastic tube and pointed it in front of her. She squeezed the hairspray trigger and, as hairspray fanned out in front of her, little red lines appeared. "_Infrared,"_ she thought. She released more hairspray which revealed a couple more red lines.

She ducked under one while stepping over another, then did a jump over another and landed rolling so as to avoid two more.

The last part was the trickiest with infrared lines spaced in the perfect spots to prevent getting through them. She looked up and noticed that the lines stopped five feet in the air which left three feet above them.

She knew that she couldn't jump them so she looked around. She saw a lamp on the wall about five feet up that could be used as a handhold and she smiled.

She made sure that she could turn sideways to face the wall without hitting any of the lines and then she ran at the wall. When she got there, she stepped up on to the wall and kept running.

She could feel her self losing speed as she neared five feet up so she reached out and grabbed the lamp with one of her gloved hands, and used it to help her get a but farther up. When she got to the highest point her feet were a little bit above her on the wall and her hand was supporting some of her weight and transferring it to the lamp while the rest of her weight was being used as part of the momentum that kept her going forward so she wouldn't fall straight to the ground.

She let go of the lamp then and fell to the ground, landing lightly as always.

"Okay, what just happened?" Alexis asked.

"I ran up a wall and then I used a lamp to help me turn around and run back down it which was my version of jumping five feet in the air to avoid infrareds," Addison replied whispering.

"Oh okay, that would have been really cool to watch!" Alexis commented.

"It was even cooler to do," Addison whispered back.

Peeking around the corner, Addison sprayed the hairspray so she could see the infrared only to have it reveal nothing, at the same moment Alexis said, "Addison, we have a problem."

"What is it?" Addison asked.

"Someone just used a badge to turn of the motion detectors and heat sensors."

"Do you still have control of the cameras?"

"Yes."

"Can you tell me who it is?"

"No, because whoever it is, is wearing a mask"

"Okay then, time for plan B."

"What's plan B?"

"Hold on a sec and it will be very obvious. Just keep me off the camera."

"Already done."

Addison strolled into the room and over to the painting that she was there to get. She grabbed the sides of the frame and lifted it up off of its hook. Then she took the painting out of its frame, carefully rolled it up, and put it in the round, plastic tube she had been carrying the hairspray in earlier.

She walked out of the room and towards the main entrance checking around corners before turning so she wouldn't run into anyone.

She made it through two more rooms before an alarm started blaring. Knowing that it couldn't have been her, she looked around and saw no one.

She followed her instincts and started running. She completely forgot about checking around corners which is why, when a masked Neal Caffery emerged around a corner, she slammed into him and fell to the ground whacking her head on it for the second time that day. Only this time, instead of her vision just blurring, her vision went black and the last thing she thought before she lost consciousness was, "_Why does this always happen to me?_"

**Sorry about the cliffhanger, I'll be back as soon as I can but it might be a while because school is starting back up and I have a last minute project to do. Anyway, the longest it should take is a week but if I figure out the project it might only be three or four days. And thanks to everyone who favorites, alerts, and reviews.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 3 **

Alexis lost the cameras and the comms unit when the alarm started going off. She did everything that she could to get them back, but it was to no avail.

"_What to do? What to do?"_ she asked herself.

She could go in the museum and try to help Addison but then Addison might have already gotten out for all she knew. Also, if she did that, no matter what happened, Addison would kill her.

Alexis pulled out their map and tried to figure out where Addison had pointed to on it. Even though it had just been the day before when Addison had pointed to some place on it Alexis wasn't having much luck remembering where. After 20 or so minutes, she narrowed it down to a neighborhood and then (since she was already in the car) she started it up and drove towards the neighborhood. She was hoping that an emergency meet spot wouldn't be too hard to find.

ELSEWHERE

Addison's head was pounding when she woke up. She was about to groan when she remembered what had happened the night before. She shot out of the bed that she was in which caused the world to go spinning and her to fall back on the bed.

She really didn't feel like getting back up but she forced herself to. Then, she surveyed the room, upon finding a window she walked over to it. Looking out and shading her eyes from the early morning sun, she saw a window washer contraption about two floors down. _"Ehh, it'll work if it has to,"_ she thought.

She went over to the door and opened it as quietly as she could and snuck out. The room led to a hall, which she followed till she came to an opening in the wall. Assuming it was actually the doorway to a room, she peaked around it and caught a glimpse of two guys talking.

She ducked back around the corner but, not before one of the guys caught a glimpse of her.

"So you're awake," the guy said.

She stepped out into his line of sight. "Yeah," she said throwing on a quirky smile, "and you're Neal Caffery."

"Why were you at the museum last night?" asked the other guy who, for some reason kind of reminded her of a weasel. She decided to call him Weasel Guy until she found out his name.

"I was there to have tea," she said sarcastically. She wasn't in the best mood considering that she didn't know where she was and she had a migraine.

"No, you weren't," Weasel Guy said.

"I could've been. You have no proof." She retorted.

"Oh, but we do," Weasel Guy said holding up the round, plastic tube from the night before.

"Then I hope that you have _already _figured out why I was there last night," Addison gave them both a look and sat down on one of the tan leather couches in the room hoping that her dizziness would ease a bit. She crossed her legs and looked at Neal.

Neal had been quiet while they were talking because he had been trying to figure out where he had seen the girl who had introduced herself as Zoey before. He finally figured it out and said, "You're the girl from that grocery store!"

"Wow! That was vague," she paused for a moment, "and awkward."

"What I meant was that you're the girl that I saw stealing from some grocery store in Dallas three years ago," Neal said.

"You were in Dallas three years ago?" Mozzie asked at the same time that Addison asked, "You _saw_ that?"

Instead of answering them, Neal looked at Addison and asked, "What's your real name?"

"Addison," Addison answered without thinking about it. Then, she realized her mistake.

"Wait, I thought that you told him that your name was Zoey?" Weasel Guy asked.

"I did. I have more than one name, just like how he told me that _his_ name was Nick Halden," she answered.

"Addison's your real name. It was written all over your face when you first realized what you had said," Neal said.

Addison still had a bad headache and didn't feel like arguing so she sighed and said, "Fine, you've got me there." Then she lay down on the couch and closed her eyes.

"Are you okay?" Neal asked with real concern in his voice.

Addison caught hint of the concern and replied, "It's just a bad concussion. When I wake up tomorrow, I should be fine. Oh yeah, do you mind if I take a nap?"

"It's fine," Neal answered and, despite the still rational part of Addison's brain telling her that it's not smart to sleep around possible enemies, she fell right back to sleep.

**A/N I'll try to update at least once a week. I would update more but school is starting to get in the way. Anyway, the reason Addison is irritable in this chapter is because it's one of the symptoms of a concussion. She'll be back to her old self by next chapter. Oh, and if you love Mozzie I meant no offense to him but she needed something to call him by so….** **Everyone who reviews, story alerts and, favorites is awesome.**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N Here's the next chapter sorry if there are mistakes I did my best.**

**Chapter 4**

Alexis arrived at what she was pretty sure was the meeting spot but, Addison wasn't there. She decided that she would wait a while.

Around three hours later she dozed off and stayed asleep until the morning. Upon waking up and finding out that Addison still wasn't there, she decided to go back to their hotel and hope that Addison would contact her.

Addison woke up on a leather couch and thought, "_What the Hell? Something is seriously wrong here."_

Addison laid there for a second as the memories slowly came back. She noticed that it was now evening and that her thoughts seemed clearer than they had been the last time that she woke up.

She slowly got up and stretched without getting dizzy. Then, she walked over to the window and looked out.

She was about 13 floors up with no real escape options unless she wanted to try and free climb from window seal to window seal which is possible but very tricky.

Hearing a door slam, she whipped around just as Neal walked into the room.

"You're awake," he said.

"Uh, yeah. You're not going to make me whack my head on the ground again, are you?" she asked looking a little bit freaked.

"I hope not," he replied.

"Okay," she said and then thought of something else, "Who was the weasel-like dude last time I woke up?"

"Huh?" Neal asked before he realized who she was talking about, "Oh, that's Mozzie. Do you really think that he looks like a weasel?"

"Kinda, plus I had to come up with some way to refer to him."

"Oh."

"I have to go call my friend and let her know I'm okay," Addison said and walked out of the room.

ELSEWHERE

Agent Peter Burke of the FBI walked into a museum in Italy that had been robbed the night before. Around him the Italian version of CSIs were trying to collect evidence and not finding any.

Agent Burke walked up to one of the officers pulled out his badge and said in English, "I'm Agent Peter Burke with the FBI. I have a few questions concerning this break-in."

The officer replied with heavily accented English, "What does the FBI have to do with this?"

"Well, I believe that an art thief who sometimes goes by Nick Halden is the one who stole from you last night. His real name is Neal Caffery and it's my job to find him," Agent Burke told the officer.

"Well in that case, two paintings were stolen last night. We believe that the culprit, Mr. Caffery if you are correct, stole a pass from one of the security guard's and used it to come back last night and turn off the security."

"Why did an alarm go off, then?"

"The museum had a backup security put in place on some of their paintings. It's a pressure plate that is triggered with in a second of the painting being lifted off the wall. Only one of the paintings stolen had the extra security."

"Thank you very much. We'll be in touch Mr.?" Burke asked.

"De Luca," the officer replied.

BACK AT NEAL'S HOTEL

After Addison had called Alexis to let her know that she was okay and had told her that she was staying where she was till the investigation died down a bit, an awkward silence had formed between her and Neal.

Neal hadn't been in many awkward silences. Addison had been in plenty as a result of her strangeness. So Addison was the one to pick up the TV remote and ask, "Wanna watch some TV?"

Neal wasn't a huge fan of TV but it would be relief from the awkward silence so he replied, "Sure."

Addison clicked the ON button on the remote and the TV came to life on a channel that had a woman talking about something in English.

"How did you get an English channel?" Addison asked Neal.

"I'm not exactly sure. Technology isn't my specialty," he replied.

"It's not mine either," she said. Then she clicked the display button to see what they were watching.

The display read, "Profiles on Art Thieves".

"This should be good," she said smiling. Then she asked, "This okay with you?"

"It's fine," Neal replied.

Addison turned up the volume so they could hear it better and they both leaned back on the couch.

On the TV, there were two women sitting on a couch, one was pale and the other had a bad spray tan.

"Miss Luanne is here to talk to us about some of the art thieves of this century," the woman with the bad spray tan said.

The camera panned onto the pale woman (AKA Miss Luanne) and she began talking. "The first art thief I'm going to tell you about is Neal Caffery. I believe that he chose the profession he did because he was under-appreciated as a child. He had no girl friends, no friends at all probably."

Addison looked at Neal and asked, "Is that true?"

"No, I had plenty of friends and girlfriends."

The woman on the TV continued her assessment, "He's probably stupid and inept. I believe that someone else is using him and he's not the one calling the shots."

Addison burst out laughing and Neal stared at the TV with shock all over his face.

"This is the most hilarious show ever!" Addison exclaimed.

"The next art thief is the one known only as Z," the woman on the TV said and Addison stopped laughing. She wanted to hear this.

"I believe that he has self-confidence issues which are why he leaves a calling card. He's probably stealing for the money and the fame, or should I say infamy. The money is used to buy clothes that are expensive and stand out making him more noticeable," Miss Luanne said.

_Wow! Do they have me wrong!_ Addison thought.

"Is that true about you?" Neal asked.

"No! Of course not! I don't have self-confidence issues!" Addison replied. Then she realized that she had basically just told him that she was Z. "Oh, I have_ got _to stop doing that!" she muttered as Neal just smiled.

"So if that's not it, then why _do_ you steal?" Neal asked.

"I could ask you the same question," Addison replied. Then she sighed and decided that she didn't have anything more to lose so she told him, "When, you saw me steal from the grocery store three years ago it was supposed to be the first and last time that I ever stole. I really just wanted to know if it would work. But, then my friend discovered that she could hack and we decided to see if we could pull off a couple of small time robberies. It was so much fun but, after a couple, we decided to try to pull off stealing from a small time museum with not very good security. It went smoothly and we decided that we were done."

"Then, I came home from school one day to find my sister missing and a note on the table. It read, "If you ever want you're daughter back then you will pull off every heist that I tell you to and, if you get caught, then I'll kill her. Signed, Your Old Boss." I realized that it was meant for my parents so I called my mom. She answered and I asked if she knew that Rachel was missing. She said yes and that she was trying to find her. So then I asked her about the note and she said that she had read it. She told me that she would be home soon and then hung up."

"When she got home she told me that she had gotten the first heist that my parents were supposed to pull. Then when my dad also got home they told me about how they had been famous art thieves and how they retired before I was born. So then I convinced them to have me pull of the heists. At first they argued but, eventually I convinced them. They still don't know about the crimes before that though.

"Anyway, I've pulled off all the heists but I still haven't had any luck getting my sister back," she finished.

"Well then," Neal said still processing all that she had said, "I'll help you."

**Thanks to everyone who reviews, story alerts, author alerts, and favorites. I'll do my best and hope to update at least once a week. **


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N** **Yay! I got a chapter done! It's kinda more of filler and the real action should start in the next chapter if I ever get it done. I've been working on this for a while but I haven't gotten a chance to finish it until now. I hope you enjoy and review. Sorry if there are any typos.**

Addison looked at Neal with her eyebrows raised. "And you're going to help me how?" she asked, "because from what I've seen, you're really not that great of an art thief."

Neal looked a little embarrassed, "I had some bad information."

"I _guess _that I could use some help," Addison said, "But we have to get out of here first. I don't do well with being cooped up."

"How do you suggest that we do that?" Neal asked, "I'm kind of stuck here."

"Why?"

"Because the FBI figured out that I was one of the thieves."

"Again, I think that _you're_ the one that needs help."

"I've been at this a lot longer than you. I have a guy who's dedicated years of his life to looking for me."

"Wow, I didn't know you swung that way. Not that I have any problems with it. It's just surprising is all," Addison said with a wicked smirk on her face.

"Wha-?" Neal started to say, then he realized what she was implying. "Really?" he asked.

Addison laughed, "I'm in high school. Shouldn't that explain it? I can't believe it took you that long to get it, though. Anyway, I have a plan to get you out of here without running into or alerting your boyfriend. But, first you have to prove that I can trust you."

"I got you out of the museum, didn't I?" Neal replied.

Addison shrugged her shoulders, "It's good enough for me."

ELSEWHERE

Peter Burke looked through the video feeds again.

It was the third time and something just didn't fit. There was a masked figure on the tapes who _could_ be Neal Caffery but the thief only stole the one painting that set off the alarms. The other painting wasn't in the camera's view but any way into that gallery was (even the air vent if anyone was crazy enough to try that). Even so, there was no footage or evidence of any kind that there was another thief there (except the missing painting, of course).

He would have to go back to the museum and figure it out. The main problem with that was that the Italian police didn't want him there, a fact that they made _quite_ obvious. He wondered if using the Neal Caffery method would be so terrible but he quickly shook the thought out of his head. Neal Caffery was an art thief and he needed to be caught, even if he did have skills that could be very valuable to the FBI. Also, if he tried the NC method and his wife Elizabeth ever found out about it, he very well could end up dead.

Addison put the final touches on Neal's disguise. She was amazing at creating disguises.

Neal was now sandy blonde with brown eyes. He was dressed in jeans and a t-shirt and looked like a normal person.

"Ta-da!" Addison said as she turned him around to face the nearest mirror. "And. in case that alone isn't enough, I'm going to go down there screaming and complaining about my room and my dad."

"Am I supposed to be your dad?" Neal asked thinking that he didn't look nearly old enough for anything like that.

"No, you're playing the part of my boyfriend and not a publicly affectionate one. As for the room part, I grabbed a room key off some random chubby guy with black hair. He was wearing one of those horrid "Gone Fishing" button-up shirts with the same tiny picture of an ugly fish jumping out of the water repeated seventy-five thousand times on it. Not that I'm a fashion snob but _that _would be cause for anyone to complain."

"Okay, I see where you're going with this."

"You should. The guy is gone all day and Alexis put a tracker on their rental car to make sure of it. Now, I'll be yelling and screaming about how the room key doesn't work and making a scene. Once you're out and a block away you call me and I'll use that as my reason for forgetting about all of my problems to go hang out with my boyfriend. Sound good to you?"

"Mostly, except, what if someone calls security?"

"I apologize and calmly walk out the door to get some fresh air and cool down."

"Okay then, I'm good."

They waked out the door to start Operation: Get-Neal-Out-of-Hotel-Without-his-Boyfriend. Addison was the one who named it.

"Aaarrrggghhhh," Addison screamed as if she were frustrated when she approached the lobby. Neal was behind her waiting for the crowd to get distracted before he snuck past.

Addison stomped down the last couple of steps leading to the lobby screaming, "Stupid fucking card! Won't let me in the damn door!" while throwing her arms down in a brilliant mimic of someone pissed and attracting the stares of everyone there.

"Ma'am, are you okay?" the desk clerk asked in English.

"No!" she yelled back, "How could I be? I can't get in my room!"

"Ma'am maybe if I could see your room key I could help," the desk clerk

said but no one could hear him because Addison was already yelling again.

"I mean first, it's the damn fishing shirts and now he can't even get a decent hotel with working room keys!"

"Ma'am!" the man called louder, "If you give me the room key and can trade it out with another one."

Addison walked to the desk and handed over the card.

The man inspected it for a second the said, "This is a money card for the restaurant down the street."

Addison glanced at it and realized that it was.

_Guess I should have checked it first, _she thought, _Oh well, I can make this work._

"Oh, I guess that's why it didn't work," she said like she was embarrassed, "How was I supposed to know? I can't read Italian."

Addison paused for a second, "Could you get me the actual room key for room 207 please?" she asked. She had seen the fat guy come out of that room earlier.

"I'm sorry I can't do that unless you have the room key with you."

"Well, if I had the room key then-," Addison was cut off from building another fake tantrum by her cell phone ringing.

"Hello?" she asked as she flipped open her phone.

"I'm here," Neal replied on the other end.

Addison waited a second and plastered a smile on her face before replying, "Oh! I love you, too! I'll be right there!" and snapping her phone shut.

"Whatever, it doesn't matter 'cause I'm going to stay with my boyfriend," she said to the desk clerk as she turned away, still smiling.

"Later," she called as she dashed to the door.

Just before the door closed behind her she heard someone mutter in Italian, "That girl had to have been PMSing."

Addison smiled and laughed as she walked down the street and joined Neal at the corner.

"So where are we headed?" Neal asked.

Addison pointed across the street at the restaurant.

"Why?" Neal asked.

Addison smiled wickedly at the bad joke in her head, "Because I've got a card," she said as she pulled out the card and flipped in her fingers so Neal could see the name of the restaurant on the card.

"That's the card you swiped from the guy with the fishing shirt, isn't it?" Neal asked.

"Oh yeah, I guess I should be more careful next time." She shrugged, "Oh well, it looks like a good place to talk and plan."


End file.
